The American missile attack on Syria won’t topple its government or change the policies of Damascus, the governor of Homs province said after a barrage of 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles targeted a Syrian airfield located there.

“The Syrian leadership and Syrian policy will not change,” Talal Barazi said in a phone interview with Syrian state television. “This targeting was not the first and I don't believe it will be the last.”

Speaking live on Al-Mayadeen TV, Barazi said that there were dead and injured in the strike on airbase. The number of casualties was not immediately clear.

He said firefighting and rescue operations were under way at the Shayrat airfield after the US attack, but that he believed that there were not many casualties on the ground. There were conflicting reports in regional media on whether any people were injured or killed.

Barazi said Washington’s escalation of the conflict in Syria only served terrorist groups such as Islamic State.

The governor said that the base played a significant role in the recent capture of the city of Palmyra from IS.

The Syrian state TV called the attack “American aggression”.

On Friday, US warships in the eastern Mediterranean fired 59 Tomahawk missiles at the Syrian airfield, with Pentagon claiming that it was used in a chemical weapons attack against a rebel-held town in Idlib province on Tuesday.

The retaliation came before the UN or the OPCW, the chemical weapons watchdog, could investigate the incident. Washington sided with the rebel-linked activists, which accused Damascus of killing civilians with toxic gas.